Empathy and conversational enjoyment in younger and older adults

BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: Investigations of empathy across adulthood have yielded mixed findings, yet its contribution to successful social interactions is clear.

Here, the authors investigate the relationship between empathy and self-reported conversation enjoyment in 144 young adults (M age = 19.50) and 120 older adults (M age = 68.75). Participants completed three empathy-related measures (Interpersonal Reactivity Index [IRI], Toronto Empathy Questionnaire [TEQ], and Affect Intensity Measure [AIM]), and rated their enjoyment of recalled conversations with diverse targets.

On the IRI, older adults had higher scores than younger adults on Empathic Concern, but lower scores on the Personal Distress and Fantasy subscales. For younger adults, conversations with same-age acquaintances were most enjoyable and conversations with children and older adults were least enjoyable. Older adults reported similar enjoyment across all groups. However, the links between conversation enjoyment and empathy were stronger for older adults.

These results highlight the importance of a multidimensional view of empathy, and the possibility that empathy influences conversational interactions differentially across the life span.